Group seeks to overturn gay marriage banLITTLE ROCK (AP) — A group is asking the Arkansas attorney general’s office to approve language for a ballot measure next year that would repeal the state’s ban on gay marriage. Arkansans for Equality on Thursday submitted a proposed constitutional amendment to the attorney general’s office. The group’s proposal would repeal an amendment to the Arkansas Constitution that voters approved in 2004 to ban same-sex marriage. The AG must certify the...

Ex-treasurer pleads not guilty to charges LITTLE ROCK (AP) — Former Arkansas Treasurer Martha Shoffner pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges she steered state investments to a bond broker for $36,000. U.S. Magistrate Judge Joe Volpe set Shoffner’s jury trial to begin July 29 and said it will take at least four days. Shoffner entered her plea during a brief hearing before Volpe. She said little to reporters as she left the federal courthouse in downtown Little Rock, but did mention sh...

Immigration overhaul: Senate passes historic bill WASHINGTON (AP) — With a solemnity reserved for momentous occasions, the Senate passed historic legislation Thursday offering the priceless hope of citizenship to millions of immigrants living illegally in America’s shadows. The bill also promises a military-style effort to secure the long-porous border with Mexico. The bipartisan vote was 68-32 on a measure that sits atop President Barack Obama’s second-term domestic agenda. Even so, the bill...

Federal agency finds lax regulation of chemicals HOUSTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency has displayed a lack of urgency in the wake of a deadly Texas fertilizer plant explosion and must regulate potentially explosive chemicals immediately, legislators said Thursday. The Chemical Safety Board, one of several federal agencies investigating the April explosion at the West Fertilizer Co. that killed 15 people, presented its preliminary findings to the Senate Committee on Environment ...

Spy program gathered Americans’ Internet records WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration gathered U.S. citizens’ Internet data until 2011, continuing a spying program started under President George W. Bush that revealed whom Americans exchanged emails with and the Internet Protocol address of their computer, documents disclosed Thursday show. The National Security Agency ended the program that collected email logs and timing, but not content, in 2011 because it decided it didn’t effective...

US mortgage rates jump to 2-year high of 4.46 pct. WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. mortgage rates have suddenly jumped from near-record lows and are adding thousands of dollars to the cost of buying a home. The average rate on the 30-year fixed loan soared this week to 4.46 percent, according to a report Thursday from mortgage buyer Freddie Mac. That’s the highest average in two years and a full point more than a month ago. The surge in mortgage rates follows the Federal Reserve’s signal that it could ...

Witness: leaked cables contained classified info FORT MEADE, Md. (AP) — Army Pfc. Bradley Manning disclosed potentially damaging classified information in at least 117 of the more than 250,000 State Department cables he has acknowledged sending to WikiLeaks, according to evidence prosecutors presented at his court-martial Thursday. The cables published on the website of the anti-secrecy organization in late 2010 contained protected information about foreign governments; foreign relations; U....

Senators: Student loan interest rates to double WASHINGTON (AP) — Student loan rates will double Monday — at least for a while — after a compromise to keep student loan interest rates low proved unwinnable before the July 1 deadline, senators said Thursday. Sen. Tom Harkin, the chairman of the Senate education panel, said none of the proposals being circulating among lawmakers could win passage, and he urged lawmakers to extend the current rates for another year when they return from the Ju...

High school seniors fare no better than in 1970s WASHINGTON (AP) — Students preparing to leave high school are faring no better in reading or math than their peers four decades ago, the government said Thursday. Officials attributed the bleak finding on more lower-performing students staying in school rather than dropping out. The news was brighter for younger students and for blacks and Hispanics, who had the greatest gain in reading and math scores since the 1970s, according to the Nationa...

Perry, filibuster star clash over Texas abortions GRAPEVINE, Texas (AP) — Gov. Rick Perry hit back Thursday at the star of a Democratic filibuster that helped kill new Texas abortion restrictions, saying state Sen. Wendy Davis’ rise from a tough upbringing to Harvard Law graduate should have taught her the value of each human life. The Republican governor expanded on those remarks later, publicly wondering what might have happened if Davis’ own mother had undergone an abortion rather than car...

Judges: Social Security pushes approval of claims WASHINGTON (AP) — Driven to reduce a huge backlog of disability claims, Social Security is pushing judges to award benefits to people who may not deserve them, several current and former judges told Congress Thursday. Larry Butler, an administrative law judge from Fort Myers, Fla., called the system “paying down the backlog.” A former Social Security judge, J.E. Sullivan, said, “The only thing that matters in the adjudication process is signin...

Goodbye M&M’s, hello granola bars as school snacks WASHINGTON (AP) — Kids, your days of blowing off those healthier school lunches and filling up on cookies from the vending machine are numbered. The government is onto you. For the first time, the Agriculture Department is telling schools what sorts of snacks they can sell. The new restrictions announced Thursday fill a gap in nutrition rules that allowed many students to load up on fat, sugar and salt despite the existing guidelines for healt...

It’s complicated: Lots to sort out on gay marriage WASHINGTON (AP) — Two landmark Supreme Court rulings that bolster gay marriage rights don’t remove all barriers to same-sex unions by a long shot. Where gay couples live still will have a lot to do with how they’re treated. Some questions and answers about Wednesday’s court rulings: Q: Can you boil down these two big rulings — 104 pages in all — to the basics? A: In one case, the court said legally married gay couples are entitled to the same ...

Supreme Court ruling worries blacks in Ala county COLUMBIANA, Ala. (AP) — Much has changed in Shelby County since Congress passed the 1965 Voting Rights Act to protect minority rights at the polls, but much hasn’t. The county — which successfully challenged one of the law’s key provisions before the U.S. Supreme Court — has grown exponentially in the past five decades, yet its racial balance has remained roughly constant with whites constituting an overwhelming majority of the population. Bla...

Al-Qaida said to be changing its ways after leaks WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. intelligence agencies are scrambling to salvage their surveillance of al-Qaida and other terrorists who are working frantically to change how they communicate after a National Security Agency contractor leaked details of two NSA spying programs. It’s an electronic game of cat-and-mouse that could have deadly consequences if a plot is missed or a terrorist operative manages to drop out of sight. Terrorist groups had alway...

After abortion setback, Texas GOP set to try again AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — After a one-woman filibuster and a raucous crowd helped derail a GOP-led effort to restrict Texas abortions, Gov. Rick Perry announced Wednesday that he’s calling lawmakers back next week to try again. Perry ordered the Legislature to meet July 1 to begin 30 more days of work. Like the first special session, which ended in chaos overnight, the second one will include on its agenda a Republican-backed plan that critics say ...

NIH to retire most chimps from medical research WASHINGTON (AP) — It’s official: The National Institutes of Health plans to end most use of chimpanzees in government medical research, saying humans’ closest relatives “deserve special respect.” The NIH announced Wednesday that it will retire about 310 government-owned chimpanzees from research over the next few years, and keep only 50 others essentially on retainer — available if needed for crucial medical studies that could be performed no ...

Murder conviction against US Marine overturned SAN DIEGO (AP) — The military’s highest court overturned a murder conviction Wednesday against a Camp Pendleton Marine in one of the most significant cases against American troops from the Iraq war. The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces threw out the conviction of Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins III of Plymouth, Mass., who has served about half of his 11-year sentence. According to the ruling posted on the court’s website, the judges agreed with Hu...

Lawmakers want more details before funding Syria WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is balking at the administration’s first attempt to pay for lethal aid to the Syrian rebels until the White House presents a more fully developed proposal than one they received last week from Secretary of State John Kerry, including options for what the U.S. will do next if the initial surge of arms fails to improve the rebels’ standing in the civil war that’s gone on for more than two years. Lawmakers last week rej...

Artists, activists unite at Bradley Manning trial FORT MEADE, Md. (AP) — Clark Stoeckley is Bradley Manning’s most visible supporter at the soldier’s court-martial. He arrives each day in a white box truck with bold words painted on the sides: “WikiLeaks TOP SECRET Mobile Information Collection Unit.” The provocative gag even has a nonworking satellite dish and two fake security cameras on it. Stoeckley, a 30-year-old art instructor at a New Jersey college, is among the more colorful of the 1...